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I got this question a few years back in an postgrad interview and it had me stumped until the interviewer suggested the trick to it. I solved it again just now on paper and wanted to check my answer. I looked here for it using [calculus] x^x as the search term but couldn't find it.

Is this the right way to go about searching the site? I've never used the site to search for a mathematical expression so I thought maybe I'm not using the search properly because this is such a well-known problem.

If it really isn't present I'll add it as a question -- it's a classic problem and should be on our site despite having solutions available elsewhere.

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    $\begingroup$ related: Search queries involving symbols and/or TEX and I can't search on ^ $\endgroup$
    – TooTone
    Commented Mar 31, 2015 at 11:34
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    $\begingroup$ The site search isn't very good with such expressions, letting google search calculus derivative "x^x" site:math.stackexchange.com turns up this (and several irrelevant results). In the "Related" list of that, there's also this question. $\endgroup$
    – Daniel Fischer Mod
    Commented Mar 31, 2015 at 11:36
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    $\begingroup$ I've changed the title, because the original one suggested a question about "What is the derivative of $x^x$?" and not "How do I search mathematical expressions?". I've also added the search and mathjax to classify the question. Not sure if mathjax really fits so feel free to remove it. $\endgroup$
    – AlexR
    Commented Mar 31, 2015 at 17:45

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Use quotes. [calculus] "x^x" gives me a relevant thread in the first page of results.

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  • $\begingroup$ thanks. I had pretty much got there already. But even as an experienced user of the site it's really not obvious you need quotes. $\endgroup$
    – TooTone
    Commented Mar 31, 2015 at 11:39

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